Year 2017 remains one of the hottest year on record

climate change is happening at a quickened pace and thus leading to melting of huge ice bergs

GENEVA:The World Meteorological Organization reports 2017 is on track to be among the three hottest years on record, just behind the two preceding years.

While 2017 may only emerge as the third warmest year on record, scientists predict it will beat out the competition for the warmest year without a warming El Nino. These record-setting years concern those who see this as a sure sign that climate change is happening at a quickened pace.

The WMO says the overall long-term warming trend since the late 1970s is worrying and cannot be ignored. The United Nations agency says rising temperatures are ushering in more extreme weather with huge socioeconomic impact.

WMO spokeswoman Claire Nullis says the warming conditions prevailing over both the Arctic and the Antarctic are very alarming. She says the Arctic is warming at about twice the rate of the global temperature increase.

“We are very, very concerned about the rate of warming in the Arctic,” she said. “There was an Arctic Report Card released last week. It said while 2017 saw fewer records shattered than in 2016, the Arctic shows no sign of returning to the reliably frozen region it was decades ago.”

The Arctic Report Card is a peer-reviewed report that brings together the work of 85 scientists from 12 nations.

One of the main reason of melting of ice is global warming

WMO notes warmer than average temperatures dominated across much of the world’s land and ocean surfaces during November. It says the most notable temperature rises were across the Northern Hemisphere.

For example, it reports temperatures in northern Canada and northwestern Alaska were two degrees centigrade above the average, indicating a very pronounced warming in the Arctic. VOA

Earth’s global surface temperatures in 2018 were the fourth warmest since 1880 and the planet will warm further, especially since greenhouse gas emissions are continuing to rise, Nasa and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) have said.

Global temperatures in 2018 were 0.83 degrees Celsius warmer than 1951 to 1980, according to scientists at Nasa’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) in New York.

Globally, 2018’s temperatures ranked behind those of 2016, 2017 and 2015. The past five years are, collectively, the warmest years in the modern record.

“2018 is yet again an extremely warm year on top of a long-term global warming trend,” GISS Director Gavin Schmidt said in a statement on Wednesday.

Since the 1880s, the average global surface temperature has risen about 1 degree Celsius.

NASA. Pixabay

This warming has been driven in large part by increased emissions into the atmosphere of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases caused by human activities.

“Weather dynamics often affect regional temperatures, so not every region on Earth experienced similar amounts of warming,” said NOAA.

Warming trends are strongest in the Arctic region, where 2018 saw the continued loss of sea ice.